You and I have gotten here to
this chapter, beginning in verse 1. Let me read us a few verses. Galatians chapter 4 and verse
1. Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth
nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all, but is under
tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father.
Even so, we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements
of the world. But when the fullness of time
was come, God sent forth His sons, made of a woman, made under
the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might
receive the adoption of sons. And because ye are sons, God
hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying,
Father, Father. Abba, Father, wherefore thou
art no more a servant, but a son, and if a son, then an heir of
God through Christ. Now be it then, when you knew
not God, ye did service unto them which by nature are no gods.
But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God,
I turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto
ye desire again to be in bondage. He observed days, and months,
and times, and years. Heirs. Heirs. You and I have been studying
in chapter 3, and Paul has been speaking of these two things.
He's been speaking of inheritance, and he's been speaking of the
heir. Here in chapter 3 in verse 18, let me remind you of this,
what he said here. Look at this. If the inheritance
be of the law, it is no more of promise. But God gave it to
Abraham by promise. The inheritance. The inheritance. And then there in verse 29, he
said this, If ye be Christ, ye are Abraham's seed and heirs
according to the promise. So he speaks here of these two
things. The inheritance. And you know where there is inheritance.
There has to be heirs. If you're going to lead in an
inheritance, you're going to lead to the heir. And God has His
inheritance, and He has His heirs. They that be Christ's are Abraham's
seed, and they're heirs according to the promise. Let me read you
some Scripture about the inheritance. And there's no way that you and
I can read the Scriptures and study every place where this
inheritance is mentioned. and fully grasp the meaning of
that word and the whole concept of it, the inheritance. Listen
to this. They which are called might receive the promise of
eternal inheritance. Now, can you grab hold of that?
Eternal inheritance? Glenn, if you left anything but
your parents, it's temporal. But when God leaves that inheritance,
it's eternal. They which are called receive
the promise of eternal inheritance. And here's a familiar scripture,
1 Peter 1, 3, 4. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy
hath begotten us again into a lively hope through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ from the dead, listen to this, to an inheritance
that's incorruptible. Undefiled, that fadeth not away. Kept in heaven, reserved in heaven
for you. Inherited. And listen to this.
Come, ye blessed of my Father. Come, ye blessed of my Father.
Inherit the kingdom, the everlasting kingdom, the kingdom of God,
the kingdom of Christ. Come, ye blessed of my Father.
Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of
the world. That's the inheritance. an everlasting King. Every good
thing that God has for a sinner in Christ is included in this
inheritance. It's God's inheritance. And where
God has His inheritance, He has the heirs. He has His heirs. Listen to this. Is salvation
a part of the inheritance? Of course it is. Salvation is
the inheritance. Hebrews 1.14 says that God has
His heirs and sent His angels to minister to them who shall
be heirs of that salvation. Is a kingdom part of the inheritance?
Listen to what James said. You are heirs of the kingdom
which He hath promised to them that love Him. You have your
kingdom, you have your heirs. And listen to this. Is eternal
life a part of the inheritance? Of course it is. Then Paul said
to Titus, he said, we live in hope, in a living hope, heirs
of the hope of eternal life. Heirs of the hope of eternal
life. So we have the inheritance and
we have the heirs of that inheritance. And all the promises of God are
in Christ Jesus. And these promises, concerning this life are concerning
the life to come. Either the temporal promises
of the Lord concerning this world are concerning the world to come.
Whatever promise God has given us in Christ, that's the inheritance. It's the promise, fulfilling
of these promises. Be not slothful, but followers
of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises."
See what they are? See what the inheritance is?
It's the promises. The promises of God in Christ. That's the inheritance. Listen
to these verses now. Come thou unto the joys of the
Lord. You've been faithful over a few
things. I'll make you ruder over many." What is that? That's a
promise. That's the inheritance. You've
been faithful over a few things. I'm going to make you ruder over
many things. That's a promise. That's the inheritance. To him
that endeareth to the end, the same shall be saved. Saved in
the Lord when the neverlasting salvation. That's a promise.
And that's the inheritance. Listen to this one. To him that
overcometh, Will I give to eat of the tree of life which is
in the midst of the paradise of God? You'll eat of that tree
of life. That's a promise. And that promise
is the inheritance. Listen to this one. To him that
overcometh shall be clothed in white raiment, and I'll not blot
out his name out of the book of life. I'll confess his name
before my Father and before His angels. Now, ain't that a blessing?
You want your name confessed before the Father and before
His angels? I do. Well, that's a promise. And that's the inheritance. To
Him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne even
as I overcome. And I'm sat down in my Father's
throne. Now, that's a promise. You go through the Word of God
and you find these precious promises that God has given to us in Christ. And you say to yourself, now
here's the inheritance. Here's my inheritance. If you
inherit, and here's the exhortation to you, don't be slothful, brethren,
but be followers of them who through faith and patience inherit
these promises. Heirs. Heirs of God. And join heirs with the Lord
Jesus Christ. And that brings us here to verse
1. That's some of the things that we've been looking at. The
inheritance. and the errors. Now Paul does
something strange here in chapter 4, beginning here in verse 1.
He's going to teach us something about the errors. And there's
different ways that you and I can look at this. But it would take
too long if we considered two aspects that I wanted to look
at. I want to look at it just like
this, without considering both aspects, let's look at it like
this. Now I say that the heir, as long as he's a child, he differs
nothing from a servant, though he be Lord of all. But he's under
tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father,
even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements
of this world. Now let's look at this from a
historical perspective. When you and I consider the Jews,
the Jews, the Jewish nation before the coming of the Lord Jesus
Christ, that lived in the Old Testament, those believers, they
were children. They were children of God. They
were heirs, but Paul says here, they were like children. They
were like servants. They weren't grown up. They weren't
old enough, as it were, to come into their inheritance. That's
the way he speaks of it. Now, we've all seen this in the
Scripture, and that's little children. Remember the prodigal
son? When he was growing up, the father
had other men over him to train him, and to teach him, and to
whip him if he got out of line. And then there come a day when
he said, Father, I'm of age now. I want what's coming to me. I
want my inheritance. And the father gave him that,
and he went down into a far country and wasted his His substance
with righteous living. And that's what Paul is saying.
Even though we have an inheritance in those Old Testament saints,
those believers, Moses and Aaron and David and Solomon and Isaiah,
Hannah and Samuel, a host of those Old Testament believers,
in a manner, in a sense, they were under bondage. They lived
under tutors and governors. And Paul says here, those Old
Testament saints, they were heirs. They had an inheritance. They
were truly God's children. But they haven't come of age
yet. God was their Father. Things
haven't changed about that. But he likens them to heirs that
were still little children. They didn't have any freedom.
Not very much. They didn't make decisions. You
know, when a person, he's in training, he may be Lord over
the farm. But if he's five years old, he's
not going to turn him loose with decisions. He's going to be under
teachers and tutors and managers. He can't come up and say, Dad,
do this. Sell off this or plant that this year. Son, you go back. You're still being taught. You
ain't old enough to make these decisions yet. Well, that's what
Paul's speaking here about these Old Testament Jews. He said they
hadn't an inheritance. They were children of God. But
it's like a little child that they were still under these tutors. And this is how it was in the
Old Testament saints. Now listen to this, from the
time that that promise was made to our first parents, Adam and
Eve, about the seed of the woman, He's going to come and He's going
to bruise the serpent's head. From that time to the time of
Moses, they lived upon that promise. They all looked forward to the
coming of that seed to bruise the serpent's head. But you know
something, they never obtained that promise. They lived in hope
of it. They saw it afar off. Abraham
knew that Christ was coming, and he lived in hope of that
promise being fulfilled. But he died without seeing the
fulfillment of that promise. He is like a child, Paul said.
And then you come to the time of Moses, and the Lord raised
up Moses and gave the law to the children of Israel. And they
were under the bondage of that law. They weren't saved by that
law, but I tell you this, they were under that law. They had
to practice it. They just couldn't quit practicing
that law, Glenn. You had to take your eight-day-old
son out and circumcise him. You had to teach him to come
up to Jerusalem three times a year to those feasts. And all those
believing Jews in the Old Testament They were heirs of God. They
were children of God. But they were still under the
bondage of those tutors. And you know something? You know
something? Those tutors could be rough,
couldn't they? They could be rough. You remember when Aaron
had two sons? Aaron the high priest had two
sons. They were priests under Aaron.
And they went out one day and took their censers and filled
it full of strange fire and offered it up to the Lord. Remember what
the Lord did to them? He killed them. He killed them. And you remember what He told
Aaron? Remember why He killed them? He said, I'll be sanctified
in them that come near me. Now that's a tutor. That's a
tutor. And that taught Moses and it
taught Aaron and it taught you and I a very good lesson. Those
tutors were strict. And boy, when they said, you
do this, if you didn't do that, they laid some stripes on you. God killed people. You remember
Uzzah, David's friend, when they were carrying the ark on that
new ox cart? They said, here's what we'll
do. We'll just go get the ark of God and put it on a new ox
cart and we'll take it up to Jerusalem. They were just dancing.
They thought, you know, this is the way it's supposed to be
done. And the ox stumbled. And the cart hit a hole. And
that ark began to shake. And Eustis said, I better get
a hold of this thing. It's going to fall over. And
he wretchedly got that ark. And you remember what happened?
God killed him. God killed him. That's the tutor. That's what those men were under.
They were just children. They hadn't come of age yet.
They had to mind these things. The Sabbath day. They caught
a man out one day picking up sticks on the Sabbath day. And
they put him in jail and sought the Lord and said, what should
we do to this man? And you know what God told them? Now this
is the tutor that these men were under. They were heirs. They were children of God by
faith in Christ. They were waiting upon Him. But
they were under these tutors. And God told them, He said, you
take that man out and you stone him to death. I'm going to teach
you folks a lesson. Sabbath. The Sabbath. Don't break
my Sabbaths. That Sabbath is a picture of
rest in my Son. And I'm going to teach you that.
I'm going to spend 2,000 years teaching you how strict my law
is and what sin is. So when Christ comes, you'll
know something about sin and my holiness. So these were tutors
and those Jews in the Old Testament were like these little kids.
David was just like a little kid in a sense. And he was under
these tutors. And he had to keep these feast
days and these sacrifices and offer for his sin. Look over
here again with me one more time. And I want to read this to you.
I want to emphasize this in Hebrews chapter 9. Paul said, the heir, as long
as he's a child. He don't differ anything from
a servant. But he's under tutoring. That's
what those Old Testament saints were. Look here in Hebrews chapter
9. Let me read this to you again.
Here's what I'm saying. You remember what Peter said
about the law. When the Pharisees came down
from Jerusalem, and saying you had to be circumcised and keep
the law of Moses? He said, you're trying to put
a yoke upon us, which neither we nor our fathers were able
to bear. It's a yoke. It was these strict
tutors and governors and managers. And look what he says here in
chapter 9. Look in verse 9. He's talking
about the tabernacle and the sacrifices and the priesthood
and all these things that they had to do under the law. In verse
9, which was a figure for the time then present, which were
offered both gifts and sacrifices that could not make him, that
did the service perfect, complete, as pertaining to the conscience,
which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers' worships,
various worships, and carnal ordinances imposed on them. See that? imposed on them until
the time of Reformation, until the time of the coming of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And they could not shake this
law loose. They could not just say, we are
not going to keep that law anymore. I am not going to take my young
kid out and circumcise him. I am not going to do that to
him, cause him some unnecessary suffering. They had to obey this
law. It was the tutor, the governor.
And boy, sometimes it was harsh. But it was imposed on them until
the time of Reformation. Now what's that he's talking
about? Well, look back over at our text. Look in verse 4. Look
at this. Galatians chapter 4 and verse
4. It was just for a time. In verse 4, look at this. When the fullness of the time
was come, God sent forth His Son." See how long they were under
those tutors? Those strict tutors, those managers
that instructed them, taught them, and chastised them until
the fullness of the time. You know, things changed, brothers
and sisters. When Christ came, things changed.
Things changed. Now, grace has never changed. Grace was the same that clothed
our first parents with old skins as it was, Glenn, when it clothed
you in the righteousness of Christ. Grace has always been sovereign.
It's always been free in the Old Testament and New Testament.
Men were regenerated the same way in the Old Testament as they
are now. Ain't but one way of regeneration.
The Spirit coming to your heart and giving you life. One way
of putting sins away from your conscience, and that's blood.
Nothing's changed about that. But those saints in the Old Testament,
they were under bondage. They were under a yoke. They
had to keep that law, though they kept it imperfectly, though
they kept it by faith, they had to keep that law until the Son
of God came and redeemed them from that law. They had to do
it. And when Christ came, things
changed. It changed. All of the law was
fulfilled, the priesthood ceased, and now we enter into this glorious
liberty. Worldwide liberty, Jews and Gentiles
have, that they never had in the Old Testament. Things changed. He tells us that here in verse
5. He says this, look at this, "...to
redeem them that were under the law. In the fullness of time
God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law,
for this reason, to redeem them that were under the law." Now
there's two ways that Paul talks about being redeemed from this
law. We already looked at one place over in chapter 3, verse
13. He says Christ hath redeemed
us from the curse of it. From the curse of it. You've
got to be redeemed from the curse of the law. You can't deliver
yourself. You can't free yourself. You
can't redeem yourself. You have to be redeemed. Christ
redeemed us from the curse. But you know something else He
redeemed the Jews from that law? From the practice of it. from
the practice of it. And that's what they never could
shake loose from, the practice of that law. He ripped the veil
from the top to the bottom, and you could stand in the holy place
and see all the way into the most holy place. And they just
sewed it back up and just kept on doing what they were doing.
And the Lord said, this thing's whacked old. It's gone. It's
vanished away forever. When Christ came, He redeemed
them from having to practice their ceremonial law. Now, that's
a blessing, isn't it? That's a blessing. Now, in verse 6 and verse 7,
Because ye are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into
your hearts, crying, Father, Father. Wherefore, thou art no
more a servant, but a son. And if a son, then an heir of
God through Christ. See the difference? Something
happened when Christ came. Something happened that never
happened in the Old Testament. And you know what it was? Christ
actually came. He actually fulfilled the law.
He went back to heaven and prayed to the Father, and He poured
out the Holy Spirit. Not only on the Jews, but the
Gentiles. Not only there in Israel, but
all over the world. There's this universal cry about
it. Father, Father. And now those who have this spirit
of adoption, they have a liberty that those in the Old Testament
never did enjoy. You think those fellows living
back there with the yoke of the law, you think they didn't long
to be on this side of Calvary? You better bet they did. But
they weren't blessed to be there. They weren't blessed to be here
with us. They had to be back there under the tutors and the
governors. Whipping them and teaching them.
And you know that's for our sakes, wasn't it? That we may learn
from that. And we'll see that in a minute.
Now Paul says in verse 9, look at this. And now, here's his
conclusion. Now, after that ye have known
God, or rather are known of God, are you going to turn back again
to those tutors? Those weak and baggerly elements,
you want to go back under bondage again? Is that what you want?
Look what our forefathers went through, he said. And now it's changed. Christ
has redeemed us from the curse and the practice of this. You
don't want to go back there and be kids again, do you? Well, that's what he's proving
here in this chapter. Now, verse 4. Let me go back
to verse 4. When the fullness of time was
come, God sent forth His Son. Look at this. The fullness of
time. God's time. You know, if Christ
had come as soon as Adam fell, you and I would have missed some
blessings. If when Adam had fell, God had
sent His Son, you and I wouldn't have realized many things. And
the first one is this, we'd have never known the deadly fruits
of sin as we know it now. We've got 4,000 years on the
other side of Calvary that we can look back on. 4,000 years.
And look at the darkness, look at the death, look at the condemnation,
look at the world dying without a Savior. You see the effects
of sin, don't you? The work of the devil in leading
men to burn their own children in the fire, all kinds of violence
and upheaval before the cross when the world lived without
a Savior. We'd have never known that if
God had sent His Son as soon as sin entered into this world.
But He let it go for 4,000 years, and look back there at the sin.
Look at the darkness. And secondly, if Christ had come
immediately upon the entrance of sin into this world, we'd
have always wondered. Maybe we could have saved ourselves.
If God had just left us alone, Or he'd give us some other way,
maybe we could have saved ourselves. But they had 4,000 years, and
nobody saved himself. God gave them a conscience, and
they lived according to the rule and dictates of their own conscience,
from Adam to Moses. And what does the Bible say?
Death reigned. It just reigned. You live according to your conscience,
and you be as honest as you can be, and you'll save yourself.
But you don't find one single man saving himself by the rule
of his own conscience. And then the Lord raised up Moses,
gave him the law. He gave the law to the Israelites,
the moral law and the ceremonial law, and the civil law. Can they
be saved by that? They've tried it for almost 2,000
years. And you know what they got out of it? Just a knowledge
of sin, or self-righteousness, or despair. Never saved anybody. Nobody's ever been saved by conscience.
Nobody's ever been saved by the works of the law. And we've got
4,000 years to prove that. And there's some better men back
there than you and I was. That old Aristotle and those
philosophers were back there. None of them saved themselves. Thirdly, if Christ had come immediately,
right after the fall, boy, look at the precious, precious Old
Testament Scriptures, the prophecies that we wouldn't have. The pictures,
the shadows, the times. A prophet shall the Lord your
God raise up unto you. We wouldn't have that. A virgin
shall conceive and bring forth a child. We wouldn't have that.
God shall see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied."
We wouldn't have any of that. We wouldn't have that ceremonial
law teaching us of redemption by blood. Fourthly, we'd never know this,
the power of providence. We'd never know the power of
God's providence. Going back 4,000 years before
the cross, Lord, preserving that royal seed that we looked at
the other day. Preserving the Jewish nation. Preserving His
Holy Scriptures. Boy, we've got 4,000 years before
the cross. And we can see where providence
reigned through every bit of it. Right up to the cross. God had a reason for not sending
His Son until He did. In the fullness of time, 2,000
years ago, 2,000 years ago, in the fullness of
time, the exact time that God had purposed, God sent His Son. He sent the Holy Spirit, He sent
that angel to Mary and says, the Holy Ghost is going to come
upon you. And when the time was right, the Holy Ghost came upon
her, she conceived, and in the very instant that God had ordained,
she brought forth her Son in the fullness of time. You take Buddhism, it doesn't
matter when Buddha was born, does it? You can have Buddhism
without Buddha. Buddha is not important to Buddhism,
only his teaching. It don't matter when the Prophet
Muhammad was born. Who even knows when he was born?
It's not important when he was born, it's only his teaching. Anybody could have taught Islam
religion, but it's different with the gospel
in it. The gospel is rooted in history. Listen to what Brother
Edgar Andrews said, and I wrote this down, I thought this was
so good. Listen to what he said about the gospel. He said, the
gospel, rooted in history, stubbornly refuses to be reinterpreted. Ain't that wonderful? The gospel
rooted in history stubbornly refuses to be reinterpreted. Who was Jesus of Nazareth? He
was God incarnate. What did He accomplish? He died
on a real cross, outside a real city, at a real point in human
history to save His people from their sin. What did the apostles
proclaim concerning him? They preached Jesus and his literal
resurrection. They preached his literal ascension
into heaven and a definite point in time which this same Jesus
will come again. And then he makes this statement.
The authentic gospel, the real gospel, is inseparable from the
historical events which surrounds its origin. You can't separate
the gospel from time. In the fullness of time, God
sent forth His Son. There was a Jew, maybe it was
Larry King, one of those people on TV was interviewing this orthodox
Jew. And he said that, he was talking
to him about Abraham. about the person of Abraham and
when he lived and everything, that orthodox Jew said, it's
not important where Abraham lived or not. He said, it's not important
if Abraham was a real person or not. All that's important
is this teaching of Abraham. That's what some people want
to say about Christ. It's not important if he's really a virgin
born or not. It's not important, really, if
he came or not. It's just his teaching. But all
of Christianity rests upon this, the person of Christ. And you
trace His person right back to 2,000 years ago, in the fullness
of time, there in a manger in Bethlehem, is where He come into
this world. And the gospel is rooted in that
history. And if you're going to change
the gospel, you've got to change history. And you can't do that,
can you? You cannot rescind history. Whatever's
history is history. It's history. In the fullness
of time, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the
law. Now why was that important? Made
of a woman. Born of a woman. He was the Son
of Mary. Why was that important? Because
you and I fell into sin by one man. We became guilty by one man. You and I don't have to wait
until we're 10 or 12 years old to become a sinner. As by one man's disobedience,
many were made sinners. We fell into sin by one man.
We've got to be lifted up out of sin by one man. We fell by
one man. Another man has got to come now
and pick us up. We're guilty by one man. We're
made righteous by one man. Death reigned by Adam. Life reigns
by Christ. One man. And he was made under
the law. Why was that necessary? Well,
we can't be saved apart from justice. Justice has to be fulfilled. The law said to be accepted,
you've got to be perfect. You lift up your hands to God
and you say, I'm not perfect. I lift up my hands to God and
I say, I'm not perfect. But here comes the Son of God
in our likeness, in our humanity. And what does He do? He lifts
up His hands and the Father says in you, I'm well pleased. He
went about doing good and healing all that was oppressed of the
devil. He was a perfect man in our humanity. He had to be a
man to fulfill the law, to honor the law. And then when it come
down to die, Somebody, somebody had to face the punishment that
was due a broken commandment. We hadn't loved God with all
our hearts. We hadn't loved our neighbor as ourselves. What's
going to happen? The wages of sin is death. Here
comes the Son of God in our humanity and He lifts up His life on the
cross and He says it's finished and He gives up the ghost. He
fulfilled the law in the days of His life. He bore its penalty
in His death. That's why he had to be born
of a woman, and that's why he had to be born under the law.
You can't take a believer up before the throne of grace and
bring any charges against him. You can't do it. He's saved by
justice as well as mercy. The law has been fulfilled. Justice
is satisfied. God is satisfied. Christ has
died. That's what he saved. That's
what he saved. We see Jesus. who was made a
little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, that
he by the grace of God should taste death for every man. He did it. He did it. And he
says here in verse 5, here's why he did it. He was born of
a woman in the fullness of time, made under the law, now look
in verse 5, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might
receive the adoption of sons. I want to give you four things
quickly and I'll close with this. Four things about adoption. To
redeem them that were under the law that we might receive the
adoption of son. I want you to turn to these scriptures
with me. I want you to turn just over to your right to the book
of Ephesians. Four things about adoption. And
the first one is this. It's God's purpose. It's God's
purpose to adopt children. Look what He says here in chapter
1. Look in verse 5. Look what He says. Ephesians
chapter 1 and verse 5. Look in verse 4 first. According
as He hath chosen us in Him, in Christ, before the foundation
of the world, He's chosen us to salvation in Christ before
the world ever was. That we should be holy and without
blame before Him in love, having predestinated us unto the adoption
of children by Christ to Himself. See the first thing about adoption?
God purposed to do it a long, long time ago. Don't you just
find this everywhere you go in the Scripture? You can't get
away from this, can you? You know, when you go to adopt
a child, or anyone else goes to adopt a child, you don't just
haphazardly go adopt a baby, do you? It's something you do
on purpose. I have known people that went
to adopt a child, and they looked for the right child for years,
two or three years. They prayed about it and they
got the word out and they traveled to other states, some people
even other countries. It's a serious matter. You enter
into adoption on purpose. You plan for it. You're careful
about it. You pick out the right child.
And you know when God picked out the ones he's going to adopt?
Way back yonder in his eternal purpose. God predestinated us
unto the adoption of children. Now here's what happens a lot
when parents here go to adopt a child. They look for the prettiest.
They look for the healthiest. They look for a little child
that looks like them. Oh, he's got brown eyes just like me.
Let's adopt him. Oh, look how healthy he looks.
Look at his pretty little countenance. Let's adopt him. I wonder what
God looked at when He chose to adopt some of you. Do you know how the Scripture says
He chose who He was going to adopt? Look at the last portion
of that verse 5. According to the good pleasure
of His will. He chose who He would. He set
His heart upon according to His own will. That's wonderful, ain't
it? That's wonderful. I'll tell you
what, I'll tell you what. If it wasn't like that, he wouldn't
have adopted any of us. If he was going to wait and see
what we looked like, and how good we was, and how pretty we
was, he'd have passed by every one of us. Ain't none of those
fit to be my kids. I ain't bringing them into my
family. But he did it according to his own will, in his good
pleasure, in his love, in his grace. That's what made the difference.
Secondly is this, this legal aspect, and I mentioned that
in passing just a minute ago, this legal aspect of adoption. When you go to adopt a child,
and it's always been this way, if you read about the old Jewish
law, if you're going to adopt a child, you had rules to follow.
You had laws to abide by. You had terms to meet. If anything
is not fixed, if anything is left undone, if the law is not
satisfied, then what happens? We know what happens today, don't
we? You leave some little jot or
tittle that don't meet the law in adoption,
you come back two years from now and they'll come and take
your little adopted child away from you. And it happened so
many times. And it's got so fearful in our country when parents go
to adopt children, they're scared to death. What if something wasn't
signed? What if the biological father
wasn't notified? What if this and what if that?
Boy, you spend a lot of time, you get your lawyer, whatever,
making sure that all the law, all the requirements, all the
terms have been met. Because adoption is something
that legally takes place. The child you adopt, I mean,
He's yours and His name goes on your stuff down at the courthouse. How did you and I legally, lawfully,
justly become adopted sons of God? Christ hath redeemed them. Christ hath redeemed them. in
order that we might become the adopted sons of God. Ain't that
what he said? Look back over at my text. Look
back over here in chapter 4 again. Look at it in verse 5. To redeem
them that were under the law that we might receive in order
for us to receive the adoption of sons. See what happens. What happens? And the world don't
realize this. That God has to do something
for Himself before He can do anything for us. There's charges
against us that has to be answered. There's laws that have been broken
that must be paid, the debt paid. Who paid them? The Lord Jesus
Christ. Whatever the law had against
us, that debt's been paid. Whatever you owe God, the court
of heaven, it's been paid. Christ hath redeemed us. And
now we can legally and lawfully be adopted as children of God.
And that adoption will never be overturned. It'll never be
taken back. The court of heaven can never
search its books and say, wait, I found something here that we've
looked at. There's a technicality. It'll
never happen, brothers and sisters. It'll never happen. God said,
what's it going to take to make those people my adopted sons
and daughters? I want every charge answered.
I want every law fulfilled. I want the justice satisfied.
What's it going to take? It's going to take the blood
of Emmanuel. That's what it's going to take. Okay, I'll get
it. And up on the cross He goes.
But out of that, out of that, God has adopted us legally and
justly as His Son. And thirdly, and I love the truth
of this, and only the gospel sets this truth forth, look here
in verse 6. Because your sons, God hath sent
forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts. Crying, Father,
Father.